The Song celestial; or, Bhagabad-gîtâ (from the Mahâbhârata) being a discourse between Arjuna, prince of India, and the Supreme Being under the form of Krishna

CHAPTER II

San­jaya. Him, filled with such com­pas­sion and such grief, With eyes tear-​dimmed, de­spon­dent, in stern words The Driv­er, Mad­husu­dan, thus ad­dressed:

Kr­ish­na. How hath this weak­ness tak­en thee? Whence springs The in­glo­ri­ous trou­ble, shame­ful to the brave, Bar­ring the path of virtue? Nay, Ar­jun! For­bid thy­self to fee­ble­ness! it mars Thy war­rior-​name! cast off the cow­ard-​fit! Wake! Be thy­self! Arise, Scourge of thy Foes!

Ar­ju­na. How can I, in the bat­tle, shoot with shafts On Bhish­ma, or on Drona-​O thou Chief!– Both wor­ship­ful, both hon­ourable men?

Bet­ter to live on beg­gar’s bread With those we love alive, Than taste their blood in rich feasts spread, And guilti­ly sur­vive! Ah! were it worse-​who knows?–to be Vic­tor or van­quished here, When those con­front us an­gri­ly Whose death leaves liv­ing drear? In pity lost, by doubt­ings tossed, My thoughts-​dis­tract­ed-​turn To Thee, the Guide I rev­er­ence most, That I may coun­sel learn: I know not what would heal the grief Burned in­to soul and sense, If I were earth’s un­chal­lenged chief– A god–and these gone thence!

San­jaya. So spake Ar­ju­na to the Lord of Hearts, And sigh­ing,”I will not fight!” held si­lence then. To whom, with ten­der smile, (O Bhara­ta! ) While the Prince wept de­spair­ing ‘twixt those hosts, Kr­ish­na made an­swer in di­vinest verse:

Kr­ish­na. Thou grievest where no grief should be! thou speak’st Words lack­ing wis­dom! for the wise in heart Mourn not for those that live, nor those that die. Nor I, nor thou, nor any one of these, Ev­er was not, nor ev­er will not be, For ev­er and for ev­er af­ter­wards. All, that doth live, lives al­ways! To man’s frame As there come in­fan­cy and youth and age, So come there rais­ings-​up and lay­ings-​down Of oth­er and of oth­er life-​abodes, Which the wise know, and fear not. This that irks– Thy sense-​life, thrilling to the el­ements– Bring­ing thee heat and cold, sor­rows and joys, ‘Tis brief and mu­ta­ble! Bear with it, Prince! As the wise bear. The soul which is not moved, The soul that with a strong and con­stant calm Takes sor­row and takes joy in­dif­fer­ent­ly, Lives in the life undy­ing! That which is Can nev­er cease to be; that which is not Will not ex­ist. To see this truth of both Is theirs who part essence from ac­ci­dent, Sub­stance from shad­ow. In­de­struc­tible, Learn thou! the Life is, spread­ing life through all; It can­not any­where, by any means, Be any­wise di­min­ished, stayed, or changed. But for these fleet­ing frames which it in­forms With spir­it death­less, end­less, in­fi­nite, They per­ish. Let them per­ish, Prince! and fight! He who shall say, “Lo! I have slain a man!” He who shall think, “Lo! I am slain!” those both Know naught! Life can­not slay. Life is not slain! Nev­er the spir­it was born; the spir­it shall cease to be nev­er; Nev­er was time it was not; End and Be­gin­ning are dreams! Birth­less and death­less and change­less re­maineth the spir­it for ev­er; Death hath not touched it at all, dead though the house of it seems!

Who knoweth it ex­haust­less, self-​sus­tained, Im­mor­tal, in­de­struc­tible,–shall such Say, “I have killed a man, or caused to kill?”

Nay, but as when one layeth His worn-​out robes away, And tak­ing new ones, sayeth, “These will I wear to-​day!” So put­teth by the spir­it Light­ly its garb of flesh, And pas­seth to in­her­it A res­idence afresh.

I say to thee weapons reach not the Life; Flame burns it not, wa­ters can­not o’er­whelm, Nor dry winds with­er it. Im­pen­etra­ble, Un­en­tered, unas­sailed, un­harmed, un­touched, Im­mor­tal, all-​ar­riv­ing, sta­ble, sure, In­vis­ible, in­ef­fa­ble, by word And thought un­com­passed, ev­er all it­self, Thus is the Soul de­clared! How wilt thou, then,– Know­ing it so,–grieve when thou shouldst not grieve? How, if thou hear­est that the man new-​dead Is, like the man new-​born, still liv­ing man– One same, ex­is­tent Spir­it–wilt thou weep? The end of birth is death; the end of death Is birth: this is or­dained! and mournest thou, Chief of the stal­wart arm! for what be­falls Which could not oth­er­wise be­fall? The birth Of liv­ing things comes un­per­ceived; the death Comes un­per­ceived; be­tween them, be­ings per­ceive: What is there sor­row­ful here­in, dear Prince?

Won­der­ful, wist­ful, to con­tem­plate! Dif­fi­cult, doubt­ful, to speak up­on! Strange and great for tongue to re­late, Mys­ti­cal hear­ing for ev­ery one! Nor wot­teth man this, what a mar­vel it is, When see­ing, and say­ing, and hear­ing are done!

This Life with­in all liv­ing things, my Prince! Hides be­yond harm; scorn thou to suf­fer, then, For that which can­not suf­fer. Do thy part! Be mind­ful of thy name, and trem­ble not! Nought bet­ter can be­tide a mar­tial soul Than law­ful war; hap­py the war­rior To whom comes joy of bat­tle–comes, as now, Glo­ri­ous and fair, un­sought; open­ing for him A gate­way un­to Heav’n. But, if thou shunn’st This hon­ourable field–a Kshat­triya– If, know­ing thy du­ty and thy task, thou bidd’st Du­ty and task go by–that shall be sin! And those to come shall speak thee in­famy From age to age; but in­famy is worse For men of no­ble blood to bear than death! The chiefs up­on their bat­tle-​char­iots Will deem ’twas fear that drove thee from the fray. Of those who held thee mighty-​souled the scorn Thou must abide, while all thine en­emies Will scat­ter bit­ter speech of thee, to mock The val­our which thou hadst; what fate could fall More grievous­ly than this? Ei­ther–be­ing killed– Thou wilt win Swar­ga’s safe­ty, or–alive And vic­tor–thou wilt reign an earth­ly king. There­fore, arise, thou Son of Kun­ti! brace Thine arm for con­flict, nerve thy heart to meet– As things alike to thee–plea­sure or pain, Prof­it or ru­in, vic­to­ry or de­feat: So mind­ed, gird thee to the fight, for so Thou shalt not sin!

Thus far I speak to thee As from the “Sankhya”–un­spir­itu­al­ly– Hear now the deep­er teach­ing of the Yog, Which hold­ing, un­der­stand­ing, thou shalt burst Thy Karma­bandh, the bondage of wrought deeds. Here shall no end be hin­dered, no hope marred, No loss be feared: faith–yea, a lit­tle faith– Shall save thee from the an­guish of thy dread. Here, Glo­ry of the Ku­rus! shines one rule– One stead­fast rule–while shift­ing souls have laws Many and hard. Specious, but wrong­ful deem The speech of those ill-​taught ones who ex­tol The let­ter of their Vedas, say­ing, “This Is all we have, or need;” be­ing weak at heart With wants, seek­ers of Heav­en: which comes–they say– As “fruit of good deeds done;” promis­ing men Much prof­it in new births for works of faith; In var­ious rites abound­ing; fol­low­ing where­on Large mer­it shall ac­crue to­wards wealth and pow­er; Al­beit, who wealth and pow­er do most de­sire Least fix­ity of soul have such, least hold On heav­en­ly med­ita­tion. Much these teach, From Veds, con­cern­ing the “three qual­ities;” But thou, be free of the “three qual­ities,” Free of the “pairs of op­po­sites,”[FN#2] and free From that sad righ­teous­ness which cal­cu­lates; Self-​ruled, Ar­ju­na! sim­ple, sat­is­fied![FN#3] Look! like as when a tank pours wa­ter forth To suit all needs, so do these Brah­mans draw Text for all wants from tank of Holy Writ. But thou, want not! ask not! Find full re­ward Of do­ing right in right! Let right deeds be Thy mo­tive, not the fruit which comes from them. And live in ac­tion! Labour! Make thine acts Thy piety, cast­ing all self aside, Con­temn­ing gain and mer­it; equable In good or evil: equa­bil­ity Is Yog, is piety!

Yet, the right act Is less, far less, than the right-​think­ing mind. Seek refuge in thy soul; have there thy heav­en! Scorn them that fol­low virtue for her gifts! The mind of pure de­vo­tion–even here– Casts equal­ly aside good deeds and bad, Pass­ing above them. Un­to pure de­vo­tion De­vote thy­self: with per­fect med­ita­tion Comes per­fect act, and the right-​heart­ed rise– More cer­tain­ly be­cause they seek no gain– Forth from the bands of body, step by step, To high­est seats of bliss. When thy firm soul Hath shak­en off those tan­gled or­acles Which ig­no­rant­ly guide, then shall it soar To high ne­glect of what’s de­nied or said, This way or that way, in doc­tri­nal writ. Trou­bled no longer by the priest­ly lore, Safe shall it live, and sure; stead­fast­ly bent On med­ita­tion. This is Yog–and Peace!

Ar­ju­na. What is his mark who hath that stead­fast heart, Con­firmed in holy med­ita­tion? How Know we his speech, Ke­sa­va? Sits he, moves he Like oth­er men?

Kr­ish­na. When one, O Pritha’s Son! Aban­don­ing de­sires which shake the mind– Finds in his soul full com­fort for his soul, He hath at­tained the Yog–that man is such! In sor­rows not de­ject­ed, and in joys Not over­joyed; dwelling out­side the stress Of pas­sion, fear, and anger; fixed in calms Of lofty con­tem­pla­tion;–such an one Is Mu­ni, is the Sage, the true Recluse! He who to none and nowhere over­bound By ties of flesh, takes evil things and good Nei­ther de­spond­ing nor ex­ult­ing, such Bears wis­dom’s plainest mark! He who shall draw As the wise tor­toise draws its four feet safe Un­der its shield, his five frail sens­es back Un­der the spir­it’s buck­ler from the world Which else as­sails them, such an one, my Prince! Hath wis­dom’s mark! Things that so­lic­it sense Hold off from the self-​gov­erned; nay, it comes, The ap­petites of him who lives be­yond De­part,–aroused no more. Yet may it chance, O Son of Kun­ti! that a gov­erned mind Shall some time feel the sense-​storms sweep, and wrest Strong self-​con­trol by the roots. Let him re­gain His king­dom! let him con­quer this, and sit On Me in­tent. That man alone is wise Who keeps the mas­tery of him­self! If one Pon­ders on ob­jects of the sense, there springs At­trac­tion; from at­trac­tion grows de­sire, De­sire flames to fierce pas­sion, pas­sion breeds Reck­less­ness; then the mem­ory–all be­trayed– Lets no­ble pur­pose go, and saps the mind, Till pur­pose, mind, and man are all un­done. But, if one deals with ob­jects of the sense Not lov­ing and not hat­ing, mak­ing them Serve his free soul, which rests serene­ly lord, Lo! such a man comes to tran­quil­li­ty; And out of that tran­quil­li­ty shall rise The end and heal­ing of his earth­ly pains, Since the will gov­erned sets the soul at peace. The soul of the un­governed is not his, Nor hath he knowl­edge of him­self; which lacked, How grows seren­ity? and, want­ing that, Whence shall he hope for hap­pi­ness?

The mind That gives it­self to fol­low shows of sense Seeth its helm of wis­dom rent away, And, like a ship in waves of whirl­wind, drives To wreck and death. On­ly with him, great Prince! Whose sens­es are not swayed by things of sense– On­ly with him who holds his mas­tery, Shows wis­dom per­fect. What is mid­night-​gloom To un­en­light­ened souls shines wake­ful day To his clear gaze; what seems as wake­ful day Is known for night, thick night of ig­no­rance, To his true-​see­ing eyes. Such is the Saint!

And like the ocean, day by day re­ceiv­ing Floods from all lands, which nev­er over­flows Its bound­ary-​line not leap­ing, and not leav­ing, Fed by the rivers, but unswelled by those;–

So is the per­fect one! to his soul’s ocean The world of sense pours streams of witch­ery; They leave him as they find, with­out com­mo­tion, Tak­ing their trib­ute, but re­main­ing sea.

Yea! whoso, shak­ing off the yoke of flesh Lives lord, not ser­vant, of his lusts; set free From pride, from pas­sion, from the sin of “Self,” Toucheth tran­quil­li­ty! O Pritha’s Son! That is the state of Brahm! There rests no dread When that last step is reached! Live where he will, Die when he may, such pas­seth from all ‘plain­ing, To blest Nir­vana, with the Gods, at­tain­ing.

HERE EN­DETH CHAP­TER II. OF THE BHA­GAVAD-​GI­TA, En­ti­tled “Sankhya-​Yog,” Or “The Book of Doc­trines.”